Unable to boot windows... oops

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I dual booted windows xp and ubuntu in separate partitions as the norm. But when I deleted the partitons that contained ubuntu via windows disk manager, when I start my computer it gets stuck at grub errors and wont let me proceed.

I have done ALL of the following:

I canNOT load windows from the live recovery CD. It either stops and says there is no hardrive or it says the session 3 stopped due to some error. So again I can NOT run the windows cd that my laptop came with.

I tried doing live Dos disks but can't find that actually worked for me to get to a command line to do the "fix mbr" or any other sort of commands.

I tried making a supergrub CD and that didn't work either since I dont have a floppy and the USB version is not loading correctly.


I can still get into another version of linux using my USB (i have backtrack on a usb) and when I do the fdisk -l it says that I have 3 partitions that have the NTFS/Fat file systems so I know my data is all still there I just messed up the loading portion of windows and can't fix it.

In addition, when I erased the partions in windows, nothing messed up and it was acting normal until I did the first restart.



Since I m able to load backtrack, or I assume any other live boot of linux, I was thinking of trying to do a clone of my harddrive and then reformatting the computer so that the booting gets fixed and then just try to recopy the image of the old one into the new one.....

Any suggestions?

I do not have a floppy disk drive on my laptop, which is where it is messed up so I have to use a CD or USB.
 
Hi,

First off, Backtrack 3 is an awesome Distro! Anyways, so when you load the Windows XP install CD it can't find the drive? 'Fixboot' and 'fixmbr' are available in the Windows XP CD via Repair. Also Ubuntu can fix windows: arsgeek.com/2008/01/15/how-to-fix-your-windows-mbr-with-an-ubuntu-livecd/

Follow those instructions to install the package and see if that helps.

Adrian
 
When I try loading from the windows live recovery CD it will stop 90% of time saying that to avoid errors it stops at session3 of the loading sequence.

When the CD gets to the point where I can press R for recovery mode or if I try any other option, it says that it cannot find a hard drive.

Again I know there is a harddrive and it has the NTFS files because I can see them with my live boot backtrack fdisk -l so I know they are there.

I am going to try that live disk ubuntu link that you provided and see if that does anything when I get home from work. Thank you for your response and another possibility!
 
Hi,

What does it say when it stops? Could this be that you need a driver and that is why it says it can't see the drive? If so, you can slipstream the drivers you need into a WindowsXP CD using nLite (which is free). I had to do this to get around loading WindowsXP on a new Lenovo that had a SATA drive but no driver CD. Another option would be to buy a USB-to-Floppy drive (like $40) and press F6 when it asks if you need a 3rd Party Raid driver.

This site has a discussion on slipstreaming those drivers: techreport.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=60290

Just an idea...

Adrian
 
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